The Mark

by Jen Nadol

  I’d been in town just under a week when I decided to apply, after I’d explored all Bering’s neighborhoods and lounged for hours, reading in the apartment and at Lennox—the U, everyone called it. There’s only so much of that you can do, though. I got bored and found myself thinking too much about stuff I didn’t want to. Plus, I didn’t have a whole lot of money, my allowance held by Drea, who’d spent less than two hours with me since I’d arrived. She was always in a rush, sprinting to the shower, kitchen, and out the door every morning. Sometimes I never even saw her, just found a scrawled note on the table: “Sorry, AM mtg!” or “Will be late tonight.” She hadn’t been kidding about being on my own, so I figured I’d better find something to do.

  Doug, at the coffee shop, had been hesitant to hire me. His face fell as he scanned my application: the absence of previous employment, my temporary stay here.

  “You’ve never worked before?” he asked.

  “I’ve done volunteer work.”

  “Like what?”

  “Well, soup kitchens, taking food to shut-ins, umm …” I tried to remember all the places I’d tagged along with Nan. I felt guilty sitting there with him watching me skeptically.

  Doug nodded, looking a little more encouraged, but then frowning at my address. “You just moved here?”

  “Yes.”

  “For … school?”

  “No.”

  “Family?”

  “Sort of.”

  He waited, but I didn’t feel like getting into it. “And you’re only staying for the summer.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  He nodded, his face grim. I could tell he was about to end our interview, and not the right way. I realized then how much I wanted the job. Not only for the money, but more so that I’d really have a place here. Belong. I took a quick breath and decided to go for it.

  “Listen, I’ll give it to you straight. The truth is I was living with my grandmother in Pennsylvania and she died about a month ago. My parents are gone, so I’m living with my aunt for the summer. I know it’s not long, but maybe I can fill in for … I don’t know … some of the college kids who work here during the year?” It was a guess, but it must have been a good one, because Doug’s face relaxed a little. I pressed on. “I’ve come to this coffee shop every day I’ve been in Bering.”

  He nodded. “I know.”

  “I’d really like to work here. I’m a quick study and I won’t take off on you.”

  Doug was young—early twenties at the oldest—with shaggy hair the color of a Kansas wheat field and deep brown eyes. He looked at me closely for a minute, just to make sure I wasn’t bullshitting him. “I’m sorry about your grandmother.”

  “Thanks.”

  “You know, this job doesn’t pay a lot. If you’re counting on it for expenses or something …”

  I shook my head. “I’ve got some savings.”

  He took another look at my sorry application and I held my breath until he met my eyes again. “Okay, Cassandra …”

  “Cassie.”

  He smiled. “Okay, Cassie.” He stuck out his hand and I shook it, his skin warm as if he’d just set down a pot of java. “If you want it, it’s yours.” He went over the details then. It wasn’t much money, he was right, but it was enough to help with groceries and whatnot and, more importantly, it gave me somewhere to go every day. A purpose.

  It had been less than a week, but I was pretty sure Doug wasn’t sorry he’d taken a chance on me.

  I handed the Café American to the lady across the counter, scooped raspberries and ice into the blender, and started on Doug’s three mochas. It was still an hour before the lunch rush, but we had steady traffic anyway. People began their mornings at all different times, I’d learned. First in were the businesspeople with newspapers under their arms, cell phones affixed to their ears, and barely a glance at me as they whisked their insulated cups away. The next wave ran from about seven to eight. Middle management, Doug called them. Like the businesspeople, but with older suits. They looked less stressed, but somehow more harried, like they couldn’t ever remember where they’d left their wallet or car keys. The assistants and retail people were next, taking us up to ten o’clock. After that it was mostly college kids who’d stuck around for the summer and randoms—taxi drivers and graphic artists and mothers—groups on no set schedule, breaking up the waves of suits and sweats.

  I jammed out the three mochas without looking up, thankful Doug hadn’t called another order on top of this. Mochas and a smoothie were the kind of stuff that could really put you behind. I poured the pureed fruit into a cup, made a perfect whipped cream swirl, and expertly picked up the other three cups with my remaining fingers, setting all four on the bar together.

  “Couldn’t get enough of that coffee smell, eh?”

  The floppy hair was slicked back and he wore a T-shirt instead of a button-down, but those green eyes behind dark-framed glasses were instantly familiar. It took me less than a second to place him. The guy I’d passed on my way in the first time I’d come to Cuppa.

  “Well, I figured if I was spending all my time here, they might as well pay me for it.”

  His smile was uneven, charmingly lopsided. “I think they’re getting their money’s worth.”

  The bells, hung on silver cords from our wooden door, jangled and I glanced over his shoulder, feeling my knees go weak. I don’t know why I was so surprised. I’d been waiting for this since Nan died, though I’m not sure I’d understood how bad it would really be. It was like I’d been standing at the edge of a cliff, thinking it was just a short drop. Until I started to fall.

  The light around the woman walking slowly to the counter and smiling at her companion was too bright to be a reflection or sunlight or anything but the glow I knew only I could see.

  “Are you okay?” The guy was looking at me closely, his eyes more intense.

  “Fine,” I answered, barely hearing my own voice.

  “You don’t look fine. You’re very pale.” He followed my gaze toward the door, but she had moved to the counter now. Not that he could see anything anyway. He turned back to me. “You should sit down.”

  I nodded. “Yeah. I will. My break’s in a few minutes.” Doug was talking to the woman, taking her order. She was utterly ordinary. Nan’s age or a little younger, with gray-brown hair and a slight stoop. She was pale, but not exceptionally so, thin, but not in a way that suggested illness. The kind of person I’d never notice. Except that she had the mark. I realized he was still watching me, glasses guy, his fingers loosely wrapped around the cups I’d set on the counter. “Really,” I said, forcing a smile, “I’m fine. Probably too much coffee.”

  A blond woman approached the counter. “Lucas? Need help with those?”

  “Uh, sure.” He passed her two of the drinks and picked up the other two. “You sure you’re all right?” he asked, lingering. His eyes were magnetic, the green of dewy grass, with thick, dark lashes. If I hadn’t been so distracted, I’d have been happy to look at them all day.

  “Chamomile tea, light, and an espresso,” Doug called.

  “Fine,” I said to Lucas. “I’ve got to go.”

  He nodded and followed the woman, petite and very pretty, back to a table where they joined another couple.

  My mind raced and I stole glances at the two women while collecting the makings of their drinks. How would it happen? Car accident? A fall? A tumor? I watched her as I brewed tea. I couldn’t help it. She leaned her cheek against her hand, elbow propped on the table, listening to her friend with a slight smile on lightly wrinkled lips. She wore no wedding ring and I wasn’t sure if I was more relieved or saddened by the idea that she would leave no one behind. Not that I knew for sure. There could be children, a boyfriend, maybe even a husband and she’d forgotten her ring today. Of all days.

  “Cassie?” Doug stood a foot away, watching me stir the tea aimlessly.

  “I’m sorry,” I said, shaking my head. “I, uh …”

  “You
okay?”

  I nodded.

  “We’ve got a little lull. Why don’t you take five and let me finish this order?”

  I glanced back at the woman, talking quietly, still surrounded by that soft light. “Yeah. If you don’t mind, maybe I will.”

  The back room at Cuppa was cluttered with castoffs from the front. I slid into my favorite: an easy chair whose purple velvet had been worn away completely from the seat. I spent a lot of my breaks relaxing back here, but there was nothing restful about it now. It was almost worse than being faced with her. Out front, at least I had tasks. Here I had only the anxiety in my gut and a white cinder-block wall where I swear I could see images of Mr. McKenzie, Nan, the West Lakes Elementary kids flashing like a slide show. I felt like crying, but I wasn’t sure if it was because I was sorry for the woman or if it was thinking about Nan and the last time I’d seen the mark or if it was the reminder that as hard as I tried to be normal, make friends, hold a job—no matter where I lived or what I did, this awful thing would always be with me.

  I tried to do the breathing exercises from Nan’s yoga video, inhaling deeply, holding, then releasing to a slow count. After a few minutes, I felt calmer and realized that mixed with all the bad feelings was a weird impulse to talk to the woman out there. It was the first time I’d seen the mark on a stranger and known, for certain, what it meant.

  The wall clock clunked, the heavy ticking sound it makes when the minute hand passes twelve. I was startled to see I’d already been in the back nearly twenty minutes, well over my allotted ten-minute break. I stood, taking another deep breath before walking through the swinging door and back to the front room, still not sure what I would do, expecting that she’d already be gone.

  But she wasn’t. She was reaching for her purse, the glow soft and constant around her as she stood slowly, leaning a bit too long on the chair for support. I felt physically shaky, light-headed. Should I talk to her? What could I say?

  I watched as she walked toward her friend, waiting patiently near the exit. They smiled at each other and her friend opened the door. I thought about calling to her or maybe following her out.

  Instead, I only watched her leave, the sun framing her in the doorway, almost obscuring the other light as she went.

  chapter 11

  I found her obituary in the morning paper two days later. Heart attack. She’d been a social worker, divorced, mother of three, sixty-eight years old. I leaned back, the iron bench outside the bookstore hard against my spine, and thought about the ones I knew for sure—this woman, Mr. McKenzie, Nan, Mrs. Gettis, the West Lakes kids. I’d seen the mark on all of them and they’d died the same day, but there was no other connection. Nothing matched. The way they died didn’t seem to matter, nor did anything about them—age, gender, their work, whether they had family or not. The only commonality was that they’d crossed my path. But nothing explained why I saw it. Of all people, why me?

  That day, I made my first visit to the Bering Library. It was a sleek, modern building and, loyal as I was to the Ashville Library, where I’d spent countless hours, I had to admit this library won any comparison, hands-down. It was awesome.

  I started with medical reference and moved on from there. Over the course of six hours, I must have browsed fifty books on health, spirituality, psychic and paranormal phenomena, even the Bible. Nothing. Not a single mention of a physical or mental condition that would explain the mark or any references to people with an ability to see death, much less a guide about what to do with it or—what I really wanted—how to make it stop. Deep down I knew I wouldn’t find that, of course. It didn’t seem like the kind of thing I could get treated for, take some antibiotics or start a vegan diet and magically be cured.

  I felt so guilty, a black and heavy feeling, like it was my fault or that I should do something, but what could I have said to the woman at the coffee shop? How would knowing she was about to die, but not how, have helped?

  I wished then, and so many times after, that Nan were around for me to talk to. I needed a confidant, but the people I knew here—Drea, Doug, my coworkers—were totally out of the question.

  I’d talked to Tasha every day my first week in Bering, but our conversations were squeezed between school, work, parties, and her road-tripping to see the baseball team at States. I understood. End of year was hectic. By week two we’d moved on to texting, short bursts about mostly nothing: the swimsuit she’d bought, a hot guy she’d be working with over the summer. I thought about confiding in her, but I couldn’t figure out how to explain why I hadn’t before, and it never seemed the right time to bring up death anyway.

  So I kept to myself and did my best to pretend the mark didn’t exist, focusing instead on my job and Bering, which, every day, felt more like my new home rather than my parents’ old one. I still thought of them a lot. Being here, I couldn’t help it. If I’d wanted to, I could have found out exactly where their house had been. There were probably records—old phone books or deeds in City Hall. Or I could have asked Drea. Even though she hadn’t been here, she probably knew. Certainly I could have found out where the fatal accident happened. But I liked Bering—my Bering—too much. I didn’t want to know if my favorite street corner was where my parents died. Or that they’d lived in ramshackle Clinton rather than smart, urbane U Park, where I always pictured them.

  Instead, I went to student art shows and shopping at thrift stores advertised in City Paper. When I felt like it, I stayed out late, reading at the park on Bering’s south side or sitting through poetry readings at the U, though I quickly realized they weren’t my thing. I felt grown-up here, on my own, and that part was cool. A little lonely, but cool.

  It was after my second—and last—poetry event that I noticed the signs outside the registrar’s office advertising the final day to enroll in summer session. I stopped, struck by the idea, knowing I needed more to do, more to think about. I could almost hear Nan as I stood there, watching the posters flap in the light summer breeze. “What are you waiting for, Cassie?” she’d have said. “Just do it.”

  And so I did. It wasn’t how I’d planned to start, but that day I signed up for my first college class.

  chapter 12

  They shuffled into the classroom, mostly in flip-flops and sweats, barely awake, though it was well past ten in the morning. I’d known from Cuppa to expect this. I had studied their habits and clothes. I wore Converse and the cutoff jean shorts I’d found at a store near the apartment.

  I’d picked a seat near the back of the room, a theater-style auditorium, but small. Fifty-six seats. I’d counted while I was waiting. The classroom was empty when I arrived and I worried that I might be in the wrong place or, as a noncredit student, have missed some important communication about schedule change. Turns out I’m just a geek, sitting with notebook, pencil, and my Introduction to Philosophy text way too early. The truth is, I was excited about being a part of Lennox—a quasi–college student, rather than just hanging around campus.

  I didn’t know a thing about philosophy except the familiar names—Aristotle, Socrates, Plato. The ancient Greeks—our people, Nan would have said. If I wanted to keep my brain busy, philosophy seemed a good choice.

  The room started to fill about five minutes before class, the other students barely looking at me, dragging themselves to the closest chair or talking with friends. They didn’t look like they shared my enthusiasm and I wondered why they were even in this class. Probably not by choice.

  Everyone quieted when the professor walked in, wearing a plaid jacket and white beard. Santa Claus in madras. He placed his books and papers on the desk and, without a word, turned to the chalkboard and wrote: WHO AM I?

  The letters were bold, sharp white against green. I’d had lots of teachers start class by writing their name on the board. This was a little different.

  “Who am I?” he said aloud, his voice carrying easily over the rows.

  No one answered. The professor looked up, scanning us closely. I f
elt as if he were committing each of our faces to memory, though that was impossible with more than half the room’s chairs filled.

  “No one read the course description?” he said, surprised. “No one knows who I am?”

  There were a few chuckles, but that was it. He nodded, not surprised and only mildly disappointed. I felt guilty, but not enough to be the first victim. It was obvious from his tone, his stance, the fact that this was Philosophy 101 that the answer was more than just “Professor McMillan.”

  “I assume none of you have taken a philosophy course before. Correct me if I’m wrong.” No one spoke. He continued patiently, “This is a course that will require lively discussion. I expect a great deal of participation and preparation. If you cannot commit to that, you are in the wrong class and I expect your seat will be vacant next class.”

  I thought he might find a lot of vacant seats, but mine wouldn’t be one of them.

  “So,” he said, scanning the crowd. “Let’s try this again. Who am I?”

  “Professor McMillan?” someone finally ventured.

  “Yeesss,” Professor McMillan said dramatically, spreading his hands to the class. “See? It’s not so hard, is it?”

  A few people shook their heads. Of course, none of them had spoken.

  “But,” he said as I, and everyone else in the room, knew he would. “Who is Professor McMillan?”

  The door opened then and my breath caught as I recognized the man with dark-rimmed glasses who strolled in, arms laden with photocopies. “Ah,” Professor McMillan said. “Our summer TA has arrived. Lucas, thank you for joining us.”

  “A pleasure, as always,” he answered, taking a seat in the front corner.

  “Who am I?” Professor McMillan continued, giving up on us, “It’s one of the great questions of philosophy. What defines us? What makes us who we are? Can we even be defined?”

  He paused, his eyes sweeping the silent crowd. “Know thyself, for in knowing thyself, you understand others. Of course,” he added, “the great philosophers also believed true self-knowledge was impossible.”